The Ayyad family has been completely separated from the rest of their family by the Israeli barrier wall near the city of Qualquilya. In addition Nasser, right, fears the psychological effects the wall will have on his two children.

Michael Robinson Chavez

Biography

Michael Robinson Chávez has been a photographer at The Los Angeles Times since 2007. Prior to that, he worked for The Washington Post, The Boston Globe and the Associated Press. He has covered wide-ranging international assignments in over 50 countries including: the Congolese Civil War, the quakes and tsunamis in Indonesia and Chile, the Egyptian revolution, life in India’s slums, gold mining in Peru, the 2006 Hezbollah/Israeli war, the Georgian/Russian war in 2008, the conflict in Israel/Palestine and the US led invasion and occupation of Iraq.

Michael was named second place Photographer of the Year by Pictures of the Year International in 2010 and won an Award of Excellence in the same contest and category in 2008. In 2008 Michael won the Scripps Howard National Award for Photojournalism and has twice been namedPhotographer of the Year by The White House News Photographers’ Association. He has also received awards from the National Press Photographers Association, the Atlanta Photojournalism Seminar and the Society of Newspaper Design.

His work has been exhibited widely, including the Visa Pour l'image festival in France, which showed his 10-year project on Peru and photos from the 2010 Chilean earthquake, as well as at the Corcoran Gallery in Washington DC, Imagenes Havana in Cuba, Orange County Center for Contemporary Art in Santa Ana, California, Los Angeles County Museum of Art , and Ojo Ajeno in Lima, Peru. He had his photographs from the Lebanon/Israeli war of 2006 exhibited at the War Photo Ltd. Gallery in Dubrovnik and at the Museu Memorial de l’Exili in Spain. American Photography’s 25th Anniversary book featured photographs from the Georgia/Russian war which were also shown at the photo festival in Arles, France.

He has recently published a book of his photographs from Peru: “Awaiting the Rain.” In addition he teaches and lectures at workshops throughout the world including Mexico, Argentina, India, Egypt, Peru, United States and El Salvador.

The Ayyad family has been completely separated from the rest of their family by the Israeli barrier wall near the city of Qualquilya. In addition Nasser, right, fears the psychological effects the wall will have on his two children.